Seville Orange Marmalade

This time of year brings Seville oranges to the markets in Paris. For the past few years, I kept complaining they were hard to find since it’s perhaps my favorite of all jams and jellies to make and eat. But lately, they’ve been everywhere. (See? It pays to complain. Either that, or a whole lot of French produce suppliers read my blog.) And I found myself busy making a lot of marmalade, which was a whole lot easier since I came up with a brand-new, revolutionary technique which I couldn’t wait to share.

Since Seville oranges are rife with seeds, which makes slicing them difficult since you have to keep moving the seeds around with your slippery fingers, while trying to cut the oranges, then finding more, and fishing around deeper inside to extract more, plucking them out, etc…Each Seville orange has perhaps twenty to thirty inside.

So I thought, what if I was to squeeze the juice and seeds out first, strain them, then pour the juice back in? The seeds are precious commodities in jam-making, and get saved and used since they’re so high in pectin. They’re wrapped in a sack and cooked with the marmalade giving the marmalade gets a suave, jellied texture. And this simple method makes the whole process much easier.

You might be interested to know that Seville Orange Marmalade was created because of an error. Apparently an Englishwoman in 1700, the wife of a grocer, was stuck with some sour oranges that were bought cheaply from a boat that was carrying them from Seville. Since there was a storm, they wanted to get rid of their stock or oranges quickly, so the grocer bought them. But they were inedibly sour so his wife decided to try making jam from then, and viola!…Seville Orange Marmalade was invented.

I recently updated this recipe to include a pre-boiling of the orange pieces, simmering them in water until cooked through as some varieties of sour oranges tend to be resistant to cooking, and the pre-boiling ensures they’ll be fully cooked.

6 Seville oranges (see Note)

1 navel orange

10 cups (2.5 liters) water

pinch of salt

8 cups (1.6 kg) sugar

1 tablespoon Scotch (optional)

1. Wash oranges and wipe them dry. Cut each Seville orange in half, crosswise around the equator. Set a non-reactive mesh strainer over a bowl and squeeze the orange halves to remove the seeds, assisting with your fingers to remove any stubborn ones tucked deep within.

2. Tie the seeds up in cheesecloth or muslin very securely.

3. Cut each rind into 3 pieces and use a sharp chef’s knife to cut the rinds into slices or cubes as thin as possible. Each piece shouldn’t be too large (no more than a centimeter, or 1/3-inch in length.) Cut the navel orange into similar-sized pieces.

4. In a large (10-12 quart/liter) stockpot, add the orange slices, seed pouch, water, and salt, as well as the juice from the Seville oranges from step #1. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer, and cook until the peels are translucent, about 20 to 30 minutes.

(At this point, sometimes I’ll remove it from the heat after cooking them and let the mixture stand overnight, to help the seeds release any additional pectin.)

5. Stir the sugar into the mixture and bring the mixture to a full boil again, then reduce heat to a gentle boil. Stir occasionally while cooking to make sure it does not burn on the bottom. Midway during cooking, remove the seed pouch and discard.

6. Continue cooking until it has reached the jelling point, about 220F degrees, if using a candy thermometer. To test the marmalade, turn off the heat and put a small amount on a plate that has been chilled in the freezer and briefly return it to the freezer. Check it in a few minutes; it should be slightly jelled and will wrinkle just a bit when you slide your finger through it. If not, continue to cook until it is.

7. Remove from heat, then stir in the Scotch (if using), and ladle the mixture into clean jars. Sometimes I bury a piece of vanilla bean in each jar. (Which is a great way to recycle previously-used or dried-out vanilla beans.)

I don’t process my jams, since I store them in the refrigerator. But if you wish to preserve them by canning, you can read more about the process here.

Note: Sour or Seville oranges are called in French oranges amers and are available mid-winter in many other countries around the world as well.

63 comments

David, I’d suggest getting your wide funnel from Weck Online. Rather a peculiar name but they stock canning stuff. http://www.weckonline.com. If you don’t like the plastic ones Lakeland stocks a non-stick one, which is what I use and I like it a lot. http://www.lakeland.co.uk

Alisa

February 16, 2007 4:01am

The up side of not perfecting the jam making process is that friends can take pity and share their wares…. On toast with coffee….Yum!!!

Thanks for the vote of confidence, Nan. The only problem Nan that I don’t think I could do it all in ’30 Minutes or Less’.

good enough cook

February 16, 2007 10:28am

My mother, who lives in England, has the same problem finding wide-mouth funnels. On her trips to the States, she always picks up a few to give to her friends in England, who all have gardens and who all can jams and chutneys from the produce of said gardens–but can’t find canning funnels for love or money.

My local supermarket here in the American hinterlands does not reliably stock cilantro or bulghur, the fish counter is a sad mockery of all the fish-cooking advice I’ve ever gotten, and the “gourmet” cheese display would make the good readers here weep–but it DOES have wide-mouth canning funnels! David, can I send you one?

Got my funnel today at E. Dehillerin where they had to unearth it from some box stowed in the deep, dark recesses of Le Halles.
Funny, in this city of fine cuisine, it’s easier to find ‘adult novelties’ than it is to find a funnel!

LAM

February 16, 2007 1:10pm

I love your blog more and more with every entry.

Tami

February 16, 2007 1:46pm

I recently had a marmalade assembly line in my kitchen. This time I attempted some blood orange marmalade. As I was waiting for the crucial moment to gel my phone rang and I made the mistake of answering it. While I was distracted by my mother and therefore was not stirring constantly, my marmalade scorched. Ack! I was so upset. I had no more blood oranges and had spent all that time preparing. Off the heat I stirred it a bit contemplating that I was going to have to throw it out, but I just couldn’t. Then after I had stirred all the little burnt bits in to the mixture I tasted it and you know it didn’t taste really burnt or bad, just sort of a deeper, flavour. I thought it just needed to be brightened up a bit. So a large glug of Grand Marnier went into it, cooked it again for a few minutes and it was done. I renamed it Caramelized Blood Orange with Grand Marnier Marmalade. The perfect gourmet name to tag onto a total mistake rectified. I was so proud of my save and thought you and your readers would appreciate.

Jinxie

February 16, 2007 3:16pm

I brought back some killer marmalade, most made with seville oranges, from a trip to Ireland last year [my fave was a Whiskey Marm. from Avoca] and having had some success with jam making had hoped to try my hand at marmalade. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to find sevilles in my ‘hood–San Francisco. Since you used to live [and cook] out here, do you know if that variety is available in these parts? I’m thinking it might just be a European thing and I’m SOL, but if you have any leads you’d care to share, I’d be most grateful.

Betty

February 16, 2007 5:46pm

Can, you use the same recipe for kumquats? My tree is bursting full and I’d like to harvest them before the birds, squirrels and 6 year old get to them.

Jinxie: Try Monterey Market in Berkeley. That’s where I always got mine. (Elise at Simply Recipes is going to post her recipe using locally-grown Seville oranges, from Sacramento, shortly.)

Betty: I would imagine you could substitute kumquats, which will be a lot of slicing & seeding! Don’t know the exact quantities you should use but let us know how it turns out.

Sandra: Ok…but will I get slapped if I do?

m's elle

February 17, 2007 7:19pm

Oh, you’re good. You’re really good. Anyone who could get me this excited about making orange marmalade has to have som

Anne T

February 18, 2007 5:01pm

Seville orange marmalade is also my favourite, particularly on toasted rye bread. Rose Grey and Ruth Roger’s recipe for it (marmallata di arance siviglia), from ‘River Cafe Cookbook Green’, is a real winner. You boil the oranges whole, like Claudia Roden’s orange cake – the whole house smells fabulous. Also… my mum makes great kumquat marmalade using her microwave, the colour is beautiful, it keeps well and is easy once you get past the chopping and de-seeding – I was really a bit surprised, although I shouldn’t be, she is an excellent cook!

Looks great, I made some blood organge marmalade this weekend which turned out beautiful. However, after putting the jam in the jar, all the skin bits floated to the top.Any tips on how to get a nice homogenous distribution? Thank you!

Eva: Never had orange bits float to the top, since usually my marmalade is solid pieces of oranges from top to bottom. (Also, didn’t your marmalade made with blood oranges turn brown? That often happens, so I don’t use them.)

Try stirring the marmalade as it cools. Assuming that it’s going to gel, they should be suspended once it cools.

Adrienne

February 19, 2007 3:13pm

An apocryphal marmalade story – but I love it!

When Mary Queen of Scots was in exile in Spain, she was suffering from a persistent sore throat. A Spanish physician prescribed a mixture of ground-up Seville oranges and honey. It worked well – and even better; it tasted great. She was so thrilled with the results, that she had large quantities cooked up and packed into large stoneware jars, which were marked “MA” for “Maria”, “R” for “Regina”, “Malada” for “Ill”. These were shipped back to England when she returned. Courtiers got to taste this concoction, and of course anything that the Queen endorsed became a great favourite! Sadly, the “Marmalade” provided no throat protection against a sharp axe.

Another story…

Scottish wool was highly prized by textile makers in Spain. Ballast was required for the return sailings of the cargo ships. Since the raw wool was bulky, and took up more space than the desired trade items from Spain, they looked around for something worthless to balance the weight and bulk of the wool. Most city streets in Spain are lined with orange trees, valued for dense shade and the scent and beauty of their blossoms and fruit. When the ripe fruit falls to the ground, it costs money to shovel them for disposal.They provided the perfect ballast material! Faced with tons of this bitter, inedible fruit arriving at their ports, the thrifty and ingenious Scots found a use for it by making it into marmalade.

My own experience…

Living in Italy, where “Merangole” trees are used for decorative and shade purposes, I noticed that tourists would pick an orange, take one bite, and dash it to the ground in disgust. To me, they looked for all the world like Seville Oranges – and why not! My Italian neighbours were at first astounded, and then delighted, when I picked their oranges, made marmalade, and presented them with jars of it. It did not spark a marmalade industry in Nettuno, but the neighbours are still making and enjoying it, long after I returned to Canada. My other contribution to Italian cucina was Lemon Meringue Pie. Nice to know that I am long remembered for my “bite” and “sweetness”!

Marmalade is wonderful stuff for winter jamming in the kitchen. Having coaxed the produce manager at my local supermarket here in New Jersey into obtaining some I’ve been having a grand time playing variations on a theme. Seville orange marmalade with Beam Black Label, with apricots (dried, marinated before incorporation in the marmalade,) with cranberries, etc.

Sweet oranges make up into a sweet marmalade, one I find too bland and without the tang that Seville oranges have to offer. If that’s all you can find, try using sweet oranges in combination with lemon to mimic that luscious sharp sweetness of Sevilles.

The name, Marmalade, comes, or so I understand, from the Portuguese for quince, marmelo. They were used for a stiff, sweet concoction (no connection to your Paris toy shop) similar to today’s quince cheese. It would be served after dinner, as a digestif.

Elizabeth: You can cook it further until it gels, using the chilled-plate test method that I recommend, or a thermometer. The seeds are rife with pectin so if it hasn’t set, perhaps it needs a bit of a nudge.

Paula

July 23, 2008 10:34pm

Tangellos make a great substitute for seville oranges. They’re a hybrid of mandarin (also known as a tangerine) and grapefruit. They smell so fresh and sweet that I’m always surprised at the sour and slightly bitter flesh. I’m guessing the acidity level is on par with sevilles because I use a seville orange recipe and the marmalade is exceptional.

Niya

October 5, 2008 11:38am

Yummmmmmmmmm

Carlyn

December 16, 2008 5:25pm

Hello David,
Wow; I can’t thank you enough for this recipe! My son has a potted Calamondin orange tree (fruits are small, very fragrant, like tangerine, but flesh is very sour, peel is bitter) which gives us the beautiful smell of orange blossoms in the winter, and lives fine in a pot inside the house five months out of the year. The branches of the tree were heavily laden with about 200 fruit, which are quite small (about 40-50mm wide) with plenty of seeds for pectin. What to do with so many little oranges?? Marmalade, of course.
I had searched for a reasonable marmalade recipe, and came upon yours. I sliced each little orange in half, squished the seeds and juice into a bowl, sliced up the peel, then followed your recipe. It took a while, but oh.. my.. God, was it worth every minute. The flavor of this stuff is really unbelievable. Being of Scottish heritage (btw: the first records of Marmalade are from Dundee, where the legend is that, as previously mentioned, a ship from Spain ran ashore during a storm; a frugal and industrious Scots woman made jam out of all the oranges…), and having spent significant time eating marmalade in my hometown of Keith, I could not be happier with your recipe – and I’ve found a new way to love my son’s Calamondin oranges.

Your recipe seemed to work just fine for Carlyn, above. But I had 2 extra Seville oranges, & otherwise I followed the recipe’s exact proportions. I thought 10 cups of water sounded pretty generous, and sure enough, my stockpot was mostly water (and juice) with orange bits floating on top. Nevertheless, I boiled the mixture and put it on a steady simmer.

After an hour (you didn’t give any time guesstimates in the recipe, btw), I stuck a candy thermometer in the mix. Since the stuff had been boiling away for quite a while, the thermometer registered 220 degrees right away. But the orange had hardly begun to turn translucent. So I gave it another hour, at which point the orange looked about right, but it was still floating on top of about 8 cups of water.

Dear Caroline: I’m surprised the recipe didn’t work for you, and you can see from the last photo what the finished marmalade looks like.

220F is a syrup stage, and the temperature that is commonly-used to denote when jam is done. So if there are 8 cups of water, rather than a thick sugar syrup in your pot when your thermometer reads that, there may be a fault with your thermometer.

The candy thermometer is new and accurate (I checked it against boiling water), so I’m not sure what went wrong.

Thanks for the photo. If I come across some more Seville oranges on special, I’ll try it again.

In the meantime, my husband put together your panforte ice-cream recipe with candied citrus peel I made last week (an orange-cookery experiment that was successful) and it is perfect. No single ingredient stands out; all the strong flavors (nuts, spices, citrus) go together nicely. Delicious!

Caroline

shuggie

January 6, 2009 4:26pm

Hi David,

I am a little bit tardy in contributing but it is Seville orange season here now in Seville! I thought I would add a couple of things that might be helpful. First, the origin of the word marmelade is…mermelada the Spanish for jam or fruit preserve and, of course, originally Latin. Secondly, the oranges were indeed shipped back to Britain as ballast, but it was coal that came out (the coal was used to fuel the steam driven presses for the olive oil harvest that happily precedes the orange season by a few weeks). And last but not least, you might find that the orange rinds can be a bit tough if you add the sugar before they have softened. I cook the rinds and the pith etc., for two hours before adding the sugar. Give it a try this year!

With my best wishes,
Shuggie

Ruth

January 17, 2009 6:51pm

David, I just moved to a retirement community in Arizona. In the public areas there are trees with funny-looking bumpy oranges, for anyone to pick. My neighbor told me they are very sour and only good for making marmalade. I don’t think they are Seville oranges because they don’t look like your picture. Do you know anything about them? Would they work in your recipe?

David

January 17, 2009 7:20pm

Two and half litres of water for the number of oranges you propose is FAR too much.

David: That’s interesting, since I just made 6 jars of this again just yesterday, cooking the oranges for 20 minutes, and using that amount of water.

And they came out perfect, and I’m actually looking at my jars right now on my kitchen counter. But it’s nice to know there are several different recipes out there.

Ruth: If they are sour oranges (Seville or Seville-type) you’re lucky! Some sour oranges are smooth, and others are very pebbly-looking. I would take an example (with a few leaves) to your local agricultural cooperative extension, or perhaps a nursery, to make sure.

shuggie

January 24, 2009 3:18pm

Hi David,

Being an adopted Sevilliaño, this might help many of your readers confusion about what constitutes a ‘Seville’ orange, it is any orange that has been allowed to revert to its wild ancestor (just like the crab apple or the sloe plum) so that any orange trees that have not been tended or grafted for many years will have the properties required to make a tangy marmalade, so if you are lucky enough to have streets lined with them, as we do here, go out and marmalade. A final note, the reason that it is more and more difficult to find Seville oranges in the green grocers these days is that the oranges are now being processed here (shredded, boiled and frozen) and sold to the predominantly British commercial Marmalade manufacturers. They are grown commercially in groves surrounding the city but the Gitanos have been given the right to harvest those in the city.

Best wishes,
Shuggie

Tom

February 4, 2009 8:54am

David:

Thanks for the recipe! I’m spending a working vacation month in Jerez de la Frontera, my wife is traipsing around and writing her blog, me I’m officially working in the apt. we rented. Since I’m in the house (or garden) 8 hours a day and there are a whole bunch of Seville oranges in the square at the end of the calle…. well suffice to say that we are just about finished eating batch #1 or marmalade and since tomorrow will be raining, I’ll be making batch #2. I was amazed at how much the pectin in the seeds sets up the marmalade, your recipe worked fine. As a side-note, lacking any cheesecloth, i tied the seeds up in a paper coffee-filter and that bundle inside another coffee-filter and no problems at all.

Thanks again,

Tom in Jerez

Matt

February 6, 2009 1:04am

David,

Do you have an approximate weight for the oranges? I bought some Seville oranges today, and would like to try this recipe, but they are the largest ones I have ever seen. I’m thinking I may need only 3 or 4 of these large oranges.

Matt

February 7, 2009 1:36pm

Let me try asking this a different way David. Four of these oranges weigh 2 pounds 7 ounces–almost 2.5 pounds. Should I add 2 more to make this recipe, or is this enough (or more than enough)?

Matt: Thanks for your comments. I’ve never weighed my oranges so I can’t advise the weight but almost all sour oranges I’ve come across (in California, Spain, and France) are roughly the same size—each orange I’ve used is about the size of an American baseball. You can likely adjust as necessary.

Matt

February 7, 2009 5:47pm

David, thank you for the response. These must be unusual then–they are about the size of softballs, if not a bit larger. I bought them at Whole Foods, but they had a whole range of sizes from these larger ones to small ones about the size of tangerines. The smaller ones are what I have been able to buy before, so I was surprised to see these.

Kate

February 8, 2009 11:55am

Hello,
How would you change this recipe for blood orange? Also, I went to a church bazaar and there was a booth where a lady was selling champagne orange marmalade? Do you have any recipe for that? I gave it to my mother-in-law, and she said it was ‘luscious’.

Kate: I’ve never used other oranges but it should work. You could likely try replacing some of the water with champagne, but can’t advise how much (unless someone wants to send me a few bottles to “test” a recipe!)

Good luck~

Claire

February 11, 2009 6:23pm

David
Have been trying my hand at some marmalade, with reasonable success. But I seem to have one major problem … how do I get the shreds to float evenly throughout the finished jars. Sometimes they float up and set at the top and sometimes at the bottom. I’m completely flummoxed by why they do this.
Thanks
Claire

Susan

February 22, 2009 12:54pm

Thanks, David and all,

Years ago I married an orange marmalade lover. Although not a fan myself, this dutiful wife (of 36 years now) perused the shelves for the perfect orange marmalade for my husband, reading labels and holding the glass jars up to the light to see how generous (or sparse) the jars contents were of the precious shredded or chopped rind. Several times I was approached by a store employee…..”May I help you?” they would say. I must be a humorous sight holding those jars up. I have purchased jars from specialty stores, gourmet markets, country fairs and foreign food stores; only a few have “passed the test.” Ten years ago, after many years of “taste-testing” to understand the nuances of my husband’s passion, I became a fan.

When I am able to get ahold of Seville oranges, I will embark upon my first experience with making orange marmalade. (Though not with making jams or jellies.) Wish me luck…. and thanks for all the information.

Susan

H.

March 4, 2009 7:00pm

Hi David,

This marmalade turned out beautifully. I cannot believe how good it looks and tastes; even my father, the picky man that he is, thought it was great. The only issue is that I don’t know what to do with so much marmalade. Is it okay to freeze some?

Thanks,

H.

Stefan

March 7, 2009 2:52pm

Hi David, I’m using your recipe now, the stove is on! One question though — you say to remove the pouch halfway through, and then when the marmalade is done it should be removed again(!). Which is it? Thanks

Stefan: Halfway through is usually enough to release all the pectin from the seeds. Enjoy the jam!

bob

March 21, 2009 9:53pm

A bit late, but maybe still useful. I get seville (sour) oranges at Mexican fruit and vegetable markets in Los Angeles. Naranja agria (spanish name) are used extensively in Yucatecan cooking. If there is a Mexican market in your area with a wide selection, it should include seville oranges. In the winter, of course.

David, what is the refrigerator life of the marmalade if you don’t preserve them?
I have a Calamondin tree and I plan to make some.

Thanks,
Pauline

ROB

December 16, 2009 12:19pm

Hi

I have been making Seville preserve for years – I am quite scientific about it, and use a sugar refractometer to get the level of sugar just right.

I have had a problem for the last 8 years or so, obtaining ‘REAL’ Seville Oranges – EASTBOURNE EAST SUSSEX UK where I live is only getting SEVILLES ‘SHARPS’ – these are to real sevilles – as granny smiths are to decent apples – too much juice – to few pips – and no aromatic content – hence the flavour – the whole point of the exercise is no good.

any ideas how I can get hold of the Sevilles we ‘used’ to get in the good old days – a bit flabby – loads of pips – a bit dry when cut open – very thick peel – but loads of aromatics

where can i find seville oranges to make marmalade?? The fruit shops reckon it’s pretty difficult!

my option at present is to fly to england mid january & buy some there!!! Seems daft.

many thanks

Sheila Nadler

December 29, 2009 2:17pm

I would like to have a rough estimate of the timing while mixture is low boiling.
I stirred for 40 minutes. It never did thicken, although I tried the test you suggested. My answer was to add some pectin to the mixture.

Sheila: Cooking times for jam-making are like driving times: it’s impossible to say exactly how long it takes to get from one place to the next. So I find it’s best to rely on visual clues. Seville oranges & their seeds are very high in pectin so I can’t imagine it not thickening.

If you wish for a more precise method, as mentioned, you can use a candy thermometer as jelling happens at around 220ºF.

Heidi

January 7, 2010 5:32pm

David: I am making my second batch of Seville Orange Marmalade and have at least seven more to go, since I was talked into buying a box of Sevilles from my local produce man. I think he thought I was going to empty out the stores small quanity avaliable to his customers. The first batch turned out beyond lovely. I used a blood orange as my navel orange and six Sevilles…no scotch and I did not float the seeds in cheese cloth. My marmalade was not too set when I jared it, but after it had cooled and set it had the best jelly consistency. The blood orange makes for a beautiful rosy orange colored marmalade. My sister sent me an e-mail describing how delicious the marmalade was and how it matched the English Seville Marmalade she ate while living in Dorset. I sent her a note back telling her how much fun it was to make and jar. She quickly responed back and asked me when I started using my great grandmother’s signature to close a letter? I was perplexed. I scrolled down to the e-mail I sent her and sure enough there was my great grandmother’s name. WTH. Where did that come from? I did not remember signing off with her name nor did I even think of writing her name…I haven’t even thought of her in recent months. I called my mom and pleaded with her that if her daughter calls to not believe her if she calls me absent-minded. I thought that our grandmother probably signed the e-mail because she wanted the recipe rights. My mom’s next comment was, “I have Desdamonia Mapleleaf Moffit’s Maramalade recipe! So David…with a name like that I think I would have remembered if I signed the e-mail with her name. Thanks for a great blog and recipe.

Yesterday I finished making this recipe using Blood Oranges instead of Sevilles. They had no pips (weird) so I stole some from a couple of lemons and let it sit overnight as you suggested. I am having it on toast as we speak and it is FANTASTIC!!

Thanks again for a wonderful recipe!

Wendy

June 23, 2010 8:09pm

Hi David,

It’s winter here in Argentina and orange trees are everywhere, heavy with fruit. I just finished making your seville orange marmalade with oranges from a friend’s tree. These particular oranges had really big seeds and were not that tasty to eat straight, but as marmalade they became muy rico!

I grew my own Seville oranges in New Zealand on the Purerua Peninsula near Kerikeri in the far north…Bay of Islands…and found your recipe on line
j
ust so you know everyone loves it…I even added my own single malt whisky “Glenmorangie”
only 5 left so will adjust the recipe for the next batch
cheers
rosie

Adapted your recipe a bit – boiled the skins whole (well, uncut halves) in just the water and the fridged them overnight. Made the skins easy to quickly dice and shred – in fact, we used a simple shredder and was done in minutes. Then we added in all the other ingredients – great results, even easier than advertised!

kim

January 19, 2011 11:49pm

David, I’m doing the tangelo substitute. Can you give me a starting weight for the fruit? I think the tangelos are smaller than the Sevilles. If I’m using 1.6kg of sugar, how many tangelos? In weight? Thanks. I also have read dozens of recipes. This one seems perfect. I can’t wait to launch it!

max mulhern

January 20, 2011 8:54am

hi
I don’t have a candy thermometer. How long do i cook before doing the plate in the freezer test?
thanks,
max

Just home from the Marin farmers’ market with an enormous haul of Seville oranges so here goes for the next few days……….marmalade, candied peels, vin d’orange. I’m thrilled I can find them here in Northern California after having them always in Bar sur Loup, near Nice, self-styled “Cite des Orangers”.

About 12 years ago I asked one of the vendors here if he had bitter oranges. He told me he let them fall to the ground so I ordered 10lbs for the next week. When I got there he’d sold them all – and always thanks me for putting them on the map. We even trade vin d’orange for more oranges!

sharlene

January 24, 2011 11:21pm

Just an FYI – I have had great success in using funnels from Lee Valley Tools up here in Canada – they have a stainless steel one that has a large opening as well as a screw on bottom that makes it quite narrow. Very reasonable pricing too.

I just got some Seville oranges yesterday. They are quite small. The size of satsumas but very firm. The shopkeeper insisted that they were Seville oranges. Do they come in small size? I am very clueless about it so, David, if you or anyone else can enlighten me, I would appreciate it.